Messi

by Luca Caioli

  Rosario is a city of the grandchildren of immigrants, of slums and country houses. But let us leave aside the stories of immigration, the mix of cultures, languages and traditions, which are plentiful in Argentina, and return to Jorge and Celia, who fell in love and began dating at such a young age.

  On 17 June 1978 they marry in the Corazón de María church. The country is thoroughly absorbed in the World Cup – so much so that the newlyweds, honeymooning in Bariloche, still ensure that they catch the Argentina-Brazil match taking place in Rosario. The result is nil-nil. Eight days later, at River Plate’s Monumental stadium in Buenos Aires, César Luis Menotti’s Argentine national team, known in Argentina as the Albiceleste (literally meaning ‘white and sky blue’), beats Holland 3-1 to win the World Cup. Collective mania ensues. Fillol, Olguín, Galván, Passarella, Tarantini, Ardiles, Gallego, Ortiz, Bertoni, Luque and Kempes seem to banish all memories of the Proceso de Reorganización Nacional (period of military rule) – the deceased dissidents, the more than 30,000 ‘disappeared’ citizens, and the tortures and horrors of General Jorge Rafael Videla’s ferocious and bloody military dictatorship, which was instigated on 24 March 1976 with the dismissal of Isabel Perón. On the streets of Buenos Aires you can still see the words ‘Inmundo mundial’ – dirty world (cup) – painted beneath the green of a football pitch and the inscription ‘1978’.

  Two years after the coup d’état, the country is still under a reign of terror, but life goes on. Celia and Jorge become parents: Rodrigo Martín is born on 9 February 1980, and their second son, Matías Horacio, is born in one of the darkest hours of the country’s history. The date is 25 June 1982, just eleven days after the end of the Falklands War. Argentina, defeated, counts her losses (649 dead) and her casualties (more than 1,000), as well as all the men who will never forget those two and a half months under fire. Young, inexperienced and ill-equipped, volunteers convinced to enlist by a cheap patriotism in order to re-conquer the Falklands archipelago, occupied by the British in a distant 1833. Operation Rosario, the name of the key Argentine invasion led by General Leopoldo Galtieri on 2 April 1982, was the umpteenth attempt at distraction orchestrated by the military junta, intended to divert attention from the disasters of the economic programme introduced in 1980 – policies that had led to 90 per cent inflation, recession in all areas of the economy, a rise in external debt for both private companies and the State, the devaluation of salaries, and in particular the progressive impoverishment of the middle class (a characteristic of the country’s history which stands out as compared with other Latin American nations). The war should have made the country forget the dramas of the past and engulfed the people in a wave of patriotism, but Galtieri was not prepared for the Iron Lady, Margaret Thatcher, nor had he taken into account the British army.

  In a few weeks British forces quash the Argentine army – a disaster that will lead to the fall of the military junta and the celebration of democracy within the year. But the restoration of the Malvinas – the Argentine name for the Falklands – to Argentina remains an ongoing demand: in Rosario, in the Parque Nacional de la Bandera (‘national park of the flag’), a monument has been built in honour of ‘the heroes that live on the Malvinas Islands’, and the 1994 Constitution lists the territory’s restitution as an objective­ that cannot be renounced. In 1983, however, election victory belongs to Raúl Alfonsín, one of the few politicians who had kept his distance from the military, maintaining that their only objective in going to war was to reinforce the dictatorship.

  Four years later, when Celia is expecting her third child, the situation is still dramatic. In Semana Santa (Holy Week) of 1987, Argentina is on the brink of civil war. The carapintadas (literally, painted faces) – young army officers captained by Colonel Aldo Rico – have risen up against the government, demanding an end to the legal trials against human rights violations committed during the military regime. The military commanders are unwilling to obey the president. The people take to the streets to defend democracy. The CGT (Confederación General de Trabajo – the labour union) declares a general strike. On 30 April, Raúl Alfonsín addresses the crowd gathered in the Plaza de Mayo, saying: ‘The house is in order, Happy Easter’ – a phrase that will go down in history, because nothing could be further from the truth. With no power over the armed forces, the president has had to negotiate with the carapintadas, guaranteeing them an end to the military trials. The law of Obediencia Debida (due obedience) exculpates officers and their subordinates of the barbarities that were committed and deems them responsible only for having obeyed the orders of their superiors. It comes into force on 23 June 1987, the same day that Celia is admitted to the maternity ward at the Garibaldi hospital. Her other sons – Rodrigo, seven, and Matías, five – stay at home with their grandmother, while Jorge accompanies Celia to the hospital. After two boys he would have liked a girl, but the chromosomes dictate that they are to have another boy. The pregnancy has been unevent­ful, but during the final few hours complications arise. Gynaecologist Norberto Odetto diagnoses severe foetal­ distress and decides to induce labour in order to avoid any lasting effects on the baby. To this day, Jorge can recall the fear of those moments, the panic he felt when the doctor told him that he was going to use forceps, his plea that he do everything possible to avoid using those pincers, which, as is the case with many parents, concerned him greatly due to the horror stories he had heard regarding deformity and damage to one’s baby. In the end the forceps were not needed. A few minutes before six in the morning, Lionel Andrés Messi is born, weighing three kilos and measuring 47 centimetres in length, as red as a tomato and with one ear completely folded over due to the force of labour – anomalies which, as with many other newborns, disappear within the first few hours. After the scare comes happiness: the new arrival is a little bit pink, but healthy.

  Outside the confines of the hospital, however, the situation is much less calm. A bomb has exploded in the city and another in Villa Constitución, where Jorge works. Throughout Argentina the number of blasts – in response to the due obedience law – rises to fifteen. There are no victims, only material damage. The bombs reveal a country divided, overwhelmed by military power and entrenched in a grave economic crisis. The secretary of domestic commerce has just announced the enforcement of new prices for basic goods: milk and eggs are to rise by nine per cent, sugar and corn by twelve per cent, electricity by ten per cent and gas by eight per cent – difficult increases for a working-class family like the Messi-Cuccittinis, despite being able to rely on two salaries and a property to call their own. Aided by his father Eusebio, Jorge built the house over many weekends on a 300-square-metre plot of family land. A two-storey, brick building with a backyard where the children could play, and in the Las Heras neighbourhood. Lionel arrives here on 26 June, when mother and son are discharged from the Italian hospital.

  Six months later, Lionel can be seen in a family album, chubby-cheeked and smiling, on his parents’ bed, dressed in little blue trousers and a white t-shirt. At ten months he begins to chase after his older brothers. And he has his first accident. He goes out of the house – no one knows why – perhaps to play with the other children in the street, which is not yet tarred, and along which cars rarely pass. Along comes a bicycle and knocks him over. He cries desperately; everyone in the house comes running out into the street. It seems it was nothing, only a fright. But throughout the night he does not stop complaining and his left arm is swollen. They take him to hospital – broken ulna. He needs a plaster cast. Within a few weeks it has healed. His first birthday arrives and his aunts and uncles buy him a football shirt, already trying to convince him to support his future team – Newell’s Old Boys. But it is still too soon. At three years old, Leo prefers picture cards and much smaller balls – marbles. He wins multitudes of them from his playmates and his bag is always full. At nursery or at school there is always time to play with round objects. For his fourth birthday, his parents give him a white ball with red diamonds. It is then, pe
rhaps, that the fatal attraction begins. Until one day he surprises everyone. His father and brothers are playing in the street and Leo decides to join the game for the first time. On many other occasions he had preferred to keep winning marbles – but not this time. ‘We were stunned when we saw what he could do,’ says Jorge. ‘He had never played before.’

  Chapter 3

  The smallest of them all

  A summer afternoon in 1992

  The Grandoli ground is almost bare. A lot of earth and only a few spots of green near the touchline. The goalposts are in a terrible state, as is the fence, as is the building that houses the showers and dressing rooms. The neighbourhood itself is not much better: makeshift carwashes at every junction along Gutiérrez avenue, used-tyre salesmen, signs declaring ‘metals bought here’ – in other words scrap metals; there is even a piece of cardboard advertising dog-grooming ser­vices. And in the background: the popular construction towers, which appear abandoned although they are not; low, little houses, which have lost their charm of yesteryear; vegetation growing between the cracks in the asphalt; rubbish cooking in the heat; men and old folk with nothing to do; kids on bikes that are too small for them. ‘People have changed around here,’ say the oldest of the old folk, adding: ‘At night it’s scary to walk these streets.’ The delinquents have moved in.

  At three in the afternoon there is hardly a soul about. The football pitch is deserted. The kids from the neighbouring schools, who come to play sports at the Abanderado Mariano Grandoli Physical Education Centre number eight (named after a volunteer in the 1865 war who gave his life for his country), have already left and the footballers don’t arrive before five o’clock. The only person around is a teacher, in a white t-shirt, blue tracksuit and trainers. He points the way, 150 metres or so, towards the home of señor Aparicio, Lionel Messi’s first coach.

  Aparicio opens the door with wet hands – he is preparing a meal for his blind wife, Claudia, but he invites his guest to enter and make himself comfortable. Four armchairs, an enormous white dog and a certain musty odour occupy a sparse lounge dominated by an old television. Salvador Ricardo Aparicio is 78 years old, with four children, eight grand­children and four great-grandchildren; he has a worn face, with the shadow of a moustache, his body twisted like barbed wire, his voice and hands shaky. He has worked his whole life on the railways. As a youngster he wore the number 4 shirt for Club Fortín and, more than 30 years ago, he coached children on Grandoli’s 7.5 by 40 metre pitch.

  He has nurtured hundreds and hundreds of children, including Rodrigo and Matías. The eldest Messi was a speedy and powerful centre forward; the second played in defence. Grandmother Celia accompanied them to training every Tuesday and Thursday. And one summer afternoon, Leo came with them.

  ‘I needed one more to complete the ’86 team [of children born in 1986]. I was waiting for the final player with the shirt in my hands while the others were warming up. But he didn’t show up and there was this little kid kicking the ball against the stands. The cogs were turning and I said to myself, damn … I don’t know if he knows how to play but … So I went to speak to the grandmother, who was really into football, and I said to her: “Lend him to me.” She wanted to see him on the pitch. She had asked me many times to let him try out. On many occasions she would tell me about all the little guy’s talents. The mother, or the aunt, I can’t remember which, didn’t want him to play: “He’s so small, the others are all huge.” To reassure her I told her: “I’ll stand him over here, and if they attack him I’ll stop the game and take him off.”’

  So goes señor Aparicio’s story, but the Messi-Cuccittini family have a different version of events: ‘It was Celia who forced Apa to put him on when he was one short. The coach didn’t like the idea because he was so small. But his grandmother insisted, saying: “Put him on and you’ll see how well the little boy plays.” “OK,” replied Apa, “but I’m putting him near the touchline so that when he cries you can take him off yourself.”’

  Regarding what happens next there are no disagreements. Let’s return to the old coach’s narrative: ‘Well … I gave him the shirt and he put it on. The first ball came his way, he looked at it and … nothing.’

  Don Apa, as he’s known around here, gets up from his chair and mimics little Messi’s surprised expression, then sits back down and explains: ‘He’s left-footed, that’s why he didn’t get to the ball.’ He continues: ‘The second it came to his left foot, he latched onto it, and went past one guy, then another and another. I was yelling at him: “Kick it, kick it.” He was terrified someone would hurt him but he kept going and going. I don’t remember if he scored the goal – I had never seen anything like it. I said to myself: “That one’s never coming off.” And I never took him off.’

  Señor Aparicio disappears into the other room and returns with a plastic bag. He rummages through the memories of a lifetime. Finally he finds the photo he is looking for: a green pitch, a team of kids wearing red shirts and, standing just in front of a rather younger-looking Aparicio, the smallest of them all: the white trousers almost reaching his armpits, the shirt too large, the expression very serious, bowlegged. It’s Lionel; he looks like a little bird, like a flea, as his brother Rodrigo used to call him.

  ‘He was born in ’87 and he played with the ’86 team. He was the smallest in stature and the youngest, but he really stood out. And they punished him hard, but he was a distinctive player, with supernatural talent. He was born knowing how to play. When we would go to a game, people would pile in to see him. When he got the ball he destroyed it. He was unbelievable, they couldn’t stop him. He scored four or five goals a game. He scored one, against the Club de Amanecer, which was the kind you see in adverts. I remember it well: he went past everyone, including the keeper. What was his playing style? The same as it is now – free. What was he like? He was a serious kid, he always stayed quietly by his grandmother’s side. He never complained. If they hurt him he would cry sometimes but he would get up and keep running. That’s why I argue with everyone, I defend him, when they say that he’s too much of a soloist, or that he’s nothing special, or that he’s greedy.’

  His wife calls him from the next room; señor Aparicio disappears and returns to recount more memories.

  Like that video that he can’t seem to find, with some of the child prodigy’s games – ‘I used to show it to the kids to teach them what you can do with a ball at your feet’. Or the first time Leo returned from Spain and he went to visit him. ‘When they saw me it was madness. I went in the morning and when I returned it was one o’clock the next morning. We spent the whole time chatting about what football was like over there in Spain.’ Or that time when the neighbourhood organised a party in Lionel’s honour. They wanted to present him with a plaque at the Grandoli ground, but in the end Leo couldn’t go. He called later to say ‘Thanks, maybe next time.’

  The old football teacher holds no bitterness; on the contrary, he speaks with much affection about the little boy he coached all those years ago.

  ‘When I saw on TV the first goal he scored in a Barcelona shirt I started to cry. My daughter Genoveva, who was in the other room, asked: “What’s wrong dad?” “Nothing,” I said, “it’s emotional.”’

  Aparicio pulls another gem from his plastic bag. Another photo of the little blond boy, shirt too big, legs too short; in his hand he is holding a trophy, the first he ever won. It’s almost as big as he is.

  Leo is not yet five years old. And in the Grandoli ground he is already starting to experience the taste of goals and success. In the second year, he is even lucky enough to have his old man as his coach. Jorge accepts the offer from the club’s directors and takes charge of the ’87 team. They play against Alfi, one of their many fixtures across the city. And they win everything: ‘But everything, everything: the championship, the tournaments, the friendlies …’ recalls Jorge Messi, with more of a paternal pride than that of a coach.

  Apart from football, there is school. Leo goes to
school number 66, General Las Heras, at 4800 Buenos Aires street. He is accompanied by either his mother Celia, his aunt Marcela, or by the neighbour Silvia Arellano, mother of Cintia, his best friend. They go on foot, making their way across the open country or skirting the edges of the football fields on the grounds of the army barracks of the Communications Batallion 121. In little more than ten minutes they are at the door.

  Today, when approaching the entrance, the youngest class can be seen absorbed in drawing. Two of them are wearing Messi shirts. In the enormous covered pavilion, some kids in white kit are playing a match with incredible concentration. There are goals – what’s missing is the ball – a bundle of brown paper held together with tape serving instead. They move at a giddying pace, without taking too much notice of the harsh grey gravel – slaloming, feinting, dribbling. Among the players is Bruno Biancucchi, Leo’s cousin. Sweating profusely and red from the effort, his charcoal-black hair matted against his face, wearing a white-and-pink-striped earring, his companions soon mark him out as the best. The press has already dedicated a substantial number of articles to hailing him as Leo’s successor. His coaches say that he weaves really well, that he has the same talent as his cousin. And, like him, he is shy. The only thing he says is that he envies his cousin’s initiative and ability to score goals. Bruno is also a striker and he would like to wear a Barça shirt one day.